Minnco Credit Union partnered with Big Lake Public Schools on Thurs., April 3, 2025 to host their Money Matters event.  

Approximately 80 students from Stacy Palmer’s Financial Literacy and Intro to Business classes participated.   The timing for the event could not have been more perfect, as her Financial Literacy students were finishing up a unit on budgeting. The next unit they study will be savings and credit unions. 

The students were joined by 21 employees of Minnco who volunteered to participate in the seminar to help students decide how to spend their money, tabulate their results, and help and guide them throughout the day. 

About Me

As students gathered around tables set up in the High School gymnasium, they found a packet of information that laid out the next two and half hours.  The packet included an “About Me” worksheet, a budget worksheet, and a spending and savings plan.  The About Me worksheet gave the students random information about who they were going to be in the simulation, information that included their job, monthly take-home salary, and marital status. 

Event organizer and Minnco Community Engagement Coordinator Shelly Miller explained why students were not given the opportunity to choose those items themselves.

“In the past, it would take students a half hour to try to decide what they were going to be and we decided that wasn’t a good use of time,”  she said.

Once students learned about themselves, they went out into the world to complete their monthly budgets.  They visited tables that were set up for each expense category – Housing, transportation, food, fun stuff, home stuff, clothing, kid stuff, and “stuff I want”.  Volunteers were encouraged to try to upsell students into making more expensive choices in those categories.  

Students had to make real life decisions like whether they should own or rent, buy a car or take the bus, or buy designer clothes.  “I want stuff” included decisions about buying a big screen TV or a 27” TV, buying a boat, a motorcycle, video game console or sound system and each student was required to buy “fun stuff”.

When students left their tables to complete their budgets, they often chose to complete the basics of food and housing before going to the discretionary spending tables.  According to Miller, that’s normal. 

“Students like to know how much they have left over before they go to spend their money,” she explained.

Real Life Experiences

As the event progressed, it was clear that students were completely engaged.  Palmer spent most of her time encouraging and conversing with students.  One of her students came up to her and said, “Day Care is really expensive!”  That was one of the many reaction’s students shared with her as they began to realize that many of the decisions they were making, were decisions their parents made every day.  They were surprised at the price of food, furniture, and formula. 

To give the students a real-life experience, students randomly received a “Fortune or Fate” check or bill.  Some were fun, “You guessed the correct number of jelly beans in the jar, receive $75” or ordinary, “You forgot to cancel Netflix, pay $27”. 

To complete the seminar, students turned in their Spending and Savings Plan.  Their monthly expenses were tallied and had to be $100 or less than their monthly income, but not to exceed their monthly income.  A handful of students had to adjust their budgets to either add or subtract expenses. 

All About Learning

Principal Bob Dockendorf, who was present for much of the event, explained that it’s all a part of Big Lake High School’s 3E model - expose, explore, and experience.  3E exposes students to potential career pathways early on and provides many opportunities to explore and experience areas of interest.  

“It’s about getting kids real life experience,” he said.

That sentiment was shared by all the school administrators who attended the seminar.  

“We’re always looking for real life experiences to give to students,”  said Dean of Students Jake Klingelhutz. 

Those experiences are made possible through corporate partnerships.  

“As a school, we’re part of the community,” said Work-based Learning Coordinator Matt Vogel.  “We call ourselves ‘Ship Builders.’ We build relationships in the community.” 

It was the relationship the school had with Minnco Credit Union that made Minnco Money Matters possible.  

“They (students) were very fast at making decisions,” Miller said. “They got it.  They understood.”  

Everyone who participated would agree that it was a great success.